Carving-out a purpose-driven company, fully dedicated to saving lives and creating a sustainable future

To company website
At a glance
Hospital
Reference market: Environmental, Health & Safety Consulting
Growth
Revenue: ~$300m
Team
FTEs: ~1500
Location
Head office: Switzerland
Calendar
Acquisition: September 2019
Calendar
Partial exit: June 2023
Group of construction workers in safety helmets and vests looking at a building site.

overview

dss+ provides consulting services on operational risk management, operational excellence and sustainability. Through the carve-out from DuPont, Gyrus empowered the management to become an independent global operations consulting firm

~2x
revenue growth between 2019 and 2024
~3x
EBITDA growth between 2019 and 2024
8
add-on acquisitions since 2020

4 foundations

Fundamental Need

Driving safer workplaces globally and mitigating the environmental impact of industrial activity

Efficiency

Enhancing resource utilization and productivity through world-class operational excellence initiatives

Resilience

Serving a diversified, blue-chip customer base with global operations and multi-line revenue streams

Transition

Building a market-leading independent operations consultancy, integrating deep expertise in sustainability

Our investment story

  • A long-standing relationship with the former parent company and the management team – cultivated over several years - culminated in the successful carve-out of DuPont Sustainable Solutions (now dss+) from DowDuPont in 2019
  • The Gyrus team brought extensive carve-out experience, required for executing a highly complex global separation across more than 40 countries. This required a hands-on approach, fast decision-making, and pragmatic problem-solving
  • Under Gyrus ownership, dss+ was transformed from a non-core corporate division into a dynamic, independent company. Empowered by an entrepreneurial management team, the business thrived with the freedom to pursue new growth strategies
  • dss+ strengthened its Operational Excellence and Operational Risk Management capabilities through selective acquisitions in 2020 and 2021, while launching organic growth initiatives and adopting a verticalized approach focused on key client industries
  • In 2023, Gyrus sold a majority stake in dss+ to Inflexion Private Equity, while remaining invested as a minority shareholder to support the next phase of growth

Outcome

Today, dss+ is uniquely positioned as one of the very few global consulting firms focussing on advising and implementing Operational Risk Management, Operational Excellence and Sustainability projects

“Gyrus was a true growth catalyst for us. The separation from Dupont gave us independence and energized our whole organisation. The partnership with Gyrus enabled us to drive strategic growth initiatives and enable us to develop into a fast-growing, mission-driven global business”

Davide Vassallo

CEO